Between a Hard Place
by BetaBrass
Summary: Season 2 recap that fuses with early season 3 with a light Odyssey theme. Simmons was between a rock and a hard place in every sense of the phrase. Fitz takes point trying to get her back, but it may be outside of his control. Now "complete" in the sense that planned story notes are posted.
1. Between a Hard Place

In honor of the upcoming season, waiting on pins and needles to find out what happened to Simmons.

I had a wonderful time camping and stargazing this summer, which led to much daydreaming towards this story. While academics can be characterized by stuffiness, Simmons in particular struck me as the type to get her start through enthusiasm. I spent a great deal of time experimenting with whether I wanted to have dialogue or not and in the end, I opted to try out not having any. If any of you have a reaction, positive or negative, towards this story's lack of dialogue, please let me know. Also, let me know how playing with the time theme went; I was trying to go for an almost ethereal dynamic. Enjoy.

* * *

Time took another dimension when Simmons was in work mode. She and Fitz could spend five minutes planning or laying groundwork for a project only to have Coulson or another teammate come in and tell them several hours had passed. Unless a mission required a specific time limit to accomplish a task, time was a concept Fitzsimmons perceived very differently from most others. Even while working alone, as Simmons found herself doing that night, she found time to be fast at slipping by, but considerate when she focused at making a breakthrough. That night, that week, was certainly one for breakthroughs. Simmons had finally faced Fitz with her feelings, and Fitz had finally asked her out in a drawn out way. Now, Simmons hoped for a scientific one before she wrapped up for dinner.

Simmons had initially been annoyed that the door to the Kree stone's container was ajar. Ultimately, she was fascinated with the stone and was eager to get a plain look at it as she went to close the door. Time graciously slowed enough for Simmons to become cognizant of several things. For one thing, the stone, for lack of a better descriptor in categorizing its material qualities, was rapidly liquefying. For another thing, she realized that her fascination was colored with urgency, predominantly from danger of the unknown. Time slowed enough for Simmons to realize she was physically terrified, academically fascinated from this new development and that yet another, long buried part of her from her childhood days of wonder was overjoyed. Over the past year, she had allowed herself to be consumed with irrational and judgemental fears. She fully admitted to herself now that she was pleased with her fortune, tinged only with the regret that Fitz couldn't come with her and have dinner to discuss whatever they would find. Time up, Simmons spent the next moment aware of only the physical sensation of being actively pulled from her life as she knew it.

When Simmons was absorbed by the Kree artifact, she felt the distinct feeling, either real or imagined, of being bonded at the most basic level with the stone, as the stone. With the stone, she looked out into the room. Time agonizingly flowed at exactly the same rate as the clock by the door, and even dragged on as it ticked. There were no discoveries to be made, and Simmons was thoroughly stuck. Fitz returned after some time and stuck his head in, a list of what Simmons assumed was restaurants in his hand. Not seeing her, he left a moment later and again she and the room sat. Fitz came back another hour or so later. Yet again, he didn't seem too concerned; merely puzzled that Simmons wasn't where he'd last seen her the first time and still wasn't there when he checked back. He was gone again.

The time for dinner had long since passed when Fitz returned, now looking stressed, though not panicked. Again, he poked his head in and left, but was back only minutes later, having clearly gone through an active search for her. Now that Fitz had ruled out any other place Simmons could or would be, he returned to the place she had recently spent the most time. Time slowed the ride and let Simmons, the stone and the room watch in great detail as Fitz crossed the room to Simmons's work station, where she had left her notes and various equipment out. Since it was her project to study, her lab and her table, there was no need for her to pack up; Fitz finding everything out would be of no concern to him. On the rare occasion they worked separately, they would sometimes leave notes for each other, which was what Fitz was likely looking for. Finding no note, Fitz looked into the distance, hoping to again work out where she might have gone. That was when he saw the open door.

Simmons, the stone and the room, her new fellow audience members, watched as Fitz used a tablet at the workstation to enter a panic code for the facility. He had activated the fullest one, which was accompanied by flashing red lights and an alarming horn blaring on loop. It took only minutes for their team and the others who stayed at the facility to appear.

The alarm shut off and everyone listening with rapt attention to Fitz as he explained what he suspected. Fitz had made great strides in recovering levels of dexterity in his hand in the past several months, and though specific words sometimes eluded him, his speech had become quite fluid. Whatever progress he had made, however, was disguised by his delivery of his thoughts, complete with stutters, pauses, lost words, fidgets and ticks he had accumulated and then suppressed. Simmons and her cohorts witnessed the immediate reaction of worry and doubt of the team. Skye, ever the energetic one, took the initiative to do her own sweep of the facility for Simmons. As she disappeared out the door, Coulson had turned to Fitz, explaining that recent events had been stressful lately, perhaps Fitz just needed rest and Sky would soon find Simmons in the most obvious place Fitz had overlooked. While Coulson tried to bely Fitz's fears, May had taken up the tablet and was swiping through data, growing still as she studied it. As wordless as only May could be in times of confusion, she handed Coulson the tablet as Skye returned from her search, unable to produce Simmons. Together, they crowded around the tablet, still in anticipation. Simmons felt a strong wave of guilt overtake her as she heard her own tinny voice scream from the tablet, and as the team looked up at her as one. The accusation was clear in their faces. Simmons had gone.

Simmons knew the protocol the team would take in a case like this, and time was gracious in allowing her to efficiently watch the team draw a new perimeter around the artifact, based on the footage. Though the hour was late, the team felt time moving at an unmanageable rate, with every lost second adding urgency. Simmons, the Kree stone and the room sat, unmoving and watched the team grapple with their new impromptu mission. Fitz brought out the DWARFs next and inspected Simmons's new form from every angle.

Running through options, the team drastically decided to take action sooner rather than later, which took Simmons by surprise. Again the guilt washed over Simmons. The team was worried, panicked and grasping at straws, all because of her. And what was it for, really? As a child, studying every subject available in school, knowing her thirst to discover would never be truly quenched, she had always dreamed of discovering new worlds. She was the prodigy of the family, and while her father could in no way grasp many concepts that came easily to her, he succeeded in fostering Simmons's interest in other worlds. They would gaze through the cheap telescope he had pieced together from yard sales and teach her everything he knew.

He knew nothing, of course, and yet Simmons would listen with rapt attention. He would point to a star or a planet and tell Simmons he wished he knew what it was called, when and how it formed and everything in between. He would sneak her out of the house to the back garden when Simmons's mother wasn't looking, pick a new celestial body and tell her all the things he did not know. Sometimes they'd go through the garden itself and he would pick up a beetle or sit down for an episode of Star Trek and again talk about all the things he wished he knew.

Inevitably, her mother would catch on or come home and disapprovingly call Simmons in to bed. She needed her rest, her mother explained for the umpteenth time, so their daughter could focus and do well in school, where the real learning took place, rather than rhetorical questions and lists of things an unrefined carpenter and cabinet maker didn't know. It was only when Simmons got older, went to university at the early age she did, that she realized it was to her father to whom she owed much of her academic success.

She almost flunked out of university her first year from trying to ignore his teachings. Simmons had arrived at university, her mother's voice ringing in her ears, telling her Simmons needed to keep her head down and study hard to keep her success. Her professor was decidedly unimpressed with the fourteen-year-old and had begun to think Simmons's genius had been attributed to her ability to absorb and repeat information, nothing else. Against his wife's wishes, Simmons's father had gone to visit the university and see why his daughter, whom he knew to be brilliant despite his own lack of education, was flunking out of university in her first year.

Simmons's father listened as she wept and explained that though she did miss her parents, she was failing due to something other than homesickness. She had done everything her mother had said. She had kept her head down, had memorized everything and given answers she knew were correct, and yet her professors were saying she wasn't ready for the world of academia. He had wiped her tearful face and asked if she was getting what she wanted out of university life. She had been confused, and readily replied that she wasn't getting the grades she was used to. He had patiently repeated his question of whether Simmons was getting what she wanted out of her courses, and she said she didn't know. Finally, Mr. Simmons squared with his daughter. Words had never been his strength, but he would be damned before he sat back and let his daughter be defeated so early for something that to him was so simple.

In his less complex vocabulary, he finally spoke his mind in direct conflict to his wife's visions of their daughter's quantifiable success, denoting raised status for their low-born family. Simmons, he explained, knew how to obtain grades - she had learned that as a child. She also knew how to gain and process information. What she didn't have was the wisdom to know the difference between knowing and learning. Grow a little older, he explained, and she'd see that while she shut herself away reading, memorizing facts and figures, she had missed out on learning that much more by not asking questions, dialoguing and simply letting knowledge flow to her as it came and she worked it out. Simmons thought back to her mother's elocution lessons to give her a posh accent, trips to the shops to put together low-cost versions of higher class wardrobes and how her homework time was structured to maximize efficiency so she had time for extracurriculars. She remembered the hours spent with her dad, looking at the stars, the sun and everything under it down to the grass. They would tell each other what they most wanted to know about whatever they were focused on. As Simmons learned more, the game had changed. Instead, it was her father telling her about what he wished he knew about some rock and Simmons would rattle off an explanation that it was this specific type of rock, based on these proportions of assemblages of minerals, identified by these features. Yet no matter how much Simmons learned, no matter how many books she swallowed or facts she collected, she could never answer all of her father's questions.

Simmons's professor had been shocked and pleased to find his fourteen-year-old student at his office door the following Monday. Simmons had taken a well-needed break from studying that weekend, opting instead to binge on episodes of Star Trek with her father. That Monday, Simmons brought a categorized and well-ordered list of questions and comments she had accumulated over the course of the semester. He hadn't enjoyed his office hours so much in years. Since that year, her brilliance and aptitude had taken her all over the globe, both in ground-breaking conferences and in the field. Her mother's training had prepared her to rub the right elbows and steer from any conflicts while her father's preparations had granted her the rest. She had spent her life discovering things and had never looked back. Here she was, in a Kree artifact, and Simmons was both very stuck and very excited.

There was a sudden shock, jolting her out of her memories and into the lab. Face to face with Fitz's hastily set up equipment, she saw the team had assembled and was anxiously watching as Fitz made adjustments to his controls and recalibrated his attempt to produce Simmons. She had very little, yet so much to tell him when he released her from the stone, and was prepared to let him know of all of the observations she'd made while in the stone. She was conscious, for one thing, which wouldn't be possible if she were truly bonded to the stone, could it? Recalibration complete, and Fitz's equipment charging, Simmons waited in anticipation, realizing he was attempting to destabilize the structure of the artifact, should Simmons be inside and ready to be dumped out. Another jolt. It was quite painful, in an oddly muted way, and Simmons's vision flashed brightly before darkly spotting back to normal. After a third, again painful, attempt with the overexposure in her vision, Fitz came to a realization and set up recalibrations, excitedly explaining about the artifact's properties and how this one might actually work. The rest of the team filtered out his explanations and waited. The room hummed with the charging. The jolt came.

Whatever the team's or Fitz's reactions were, Simmons did not see. She felt herself crackling inside the stone, every nerve firing with the jolt. The room again flashed to black. She felt herself resolidify among the now-liquid substance and she was dumped on the floor, seeing stars.

Fitz felt his heart leap with anticipation while his stomach dropped from dread. The Kree artifact had, at the behest of his charges, grudgingly bubbled and given way to its liquid state, spreading out on the floor. When the charges ran their course, the stone shrank back like a fleeing wave from shore, building back up to its impassive shape. No one moved. Finally, Skye hitched a breath and broke the spell, shifting and looking across to the others. There was no Simmons to be had.


	2. Chapter 2

Posting the previous chapter was cathartic. It has led, however, to the irking question of what does happen to Simmons once she is transported. Where does she go? I recently had a particularly vivid dream that has inspired the follow up chapter.

Unfortunately, my schedule does not allow me to watch Shield regularly. I have resigned myself to ducking spoilers until I can catch up on everything. In the meantime, I am finding that I have pockets of free time amidst the mainly busy moments in which I can crank out the following. In this chapter, I have decided to begin introducing more dialogue and varied points of view. Let me know how it goes.

Simmons felt the heat from the electrocution crawling under her skin before gradually lessening. Blinking several times to chase the stars from her vision, she admitted to herself that that last charge was much more than she had expected. Fitz would be triumphant at getting her back so efficiently, and Simmons realized how hungry she was. They would need to postpone their dinner date, since it was too late, but there was quite a sum of leftovers they could start with. She had shocked and electrocuted herself several times over the course of different projects and the sensation always left her famished, apart from the time she'd become infected with the Chitauri virus. She'd had a throbbing headache after that one. Another observation to add to her notes. She blinked again, but the stars stayed in view. Seeing the room around her for the first time, Simmons realized she had no idea where she was.

It was simply a large storage room of sorts, comprised of aisles and walls of metal lockers. The room was filled further with alien artifacts, including the Kree stone, boxes of even more strange objects and computer terminals of some sort. It was no storage or locker room she had ever seen, and she felt small. After the high of her excitement of discovery with the Kree artifact, the next stage Simmons found herself in was abject terror. How could she have ever been so blase about the whole ordeal? The Kree artifact was clearly dangerous, and had transported Simmons far beyond anything The Wizard of Oz could compete with. And there, Simmons had been eager to live out Kirk and Spock's adventures, exploring the final frontier and boldly do what no one else had done, oblivious to her utter lack of capability in navigating alien civilizations, let alone a foreign locker room.

Knowing it was likely futile, she hoped beyond hope she could walk out the door and find herself in the hallway of the Playground, perhaps a secret floor Coulson had kept from her. Peering out the swinging door, she saw her fears realized. It was another storage room, and of a different structural design than the Playground, made of sheet metal and grating rather than the solid brick of the base. A shout snapped her attention to her right. A male humanoid, most definitely alien, was pointing at her and quickly drawing the attention of his colleagues to her presence. Simmons shrank back into the backroom where the Kree stone waited for her. It stood imperiously still. The pounding of several footsteps drew near and Simmons threw herself at the monolith. Science be damned, she would see Fitz and the rest again. Instead of the feeling of being sucked by an ocean's rip current, Simmons bodily collided with a very solid Kree artifact before landing on her back, staring at the stone. Of course, it had been an impetuous assumption that it would take her back to the Playground if indeed to Earth at all. Simmons looked back over her propped elbow and was greeted with the sight of several pairs of boots.

Still enjoying an upgrade in pay and status, Nova Corps Denarian Rhomann Dey was already en route to Kyln Prison for an inspection when he got the call for him to interview an intruder. He had spent the final hour of his journey mulling over who this new character was, having only recently warned Star Lord and his crew to stay out of trouble from now on. Dey had the distinct feeling this was someone new based on Kyln Control's operator, who had asked him to make haste to arrive. The guards at the Kyln were on edge, which was no small feat for a single intruder.

Upon arrival, Dey had ignored his normal stops for a routine inspection and headed straight for the property room, where prisoner effects were catalogued and held. Perhaps the intruder was a thief, after something another prisoner had in their possession at the time of their incarceration. Rounding the corner, Dey entered the property room and was pointed towards one of the back storage rooms where larger effects were stored. Pushing through to the back room, Dey was greeted by a guard standing next to a humanoid woman who looked decidedly unthreatening. Control had informed him over comms upon his arrival that the intruder had identified themselves as terran, which had Dey doing a double take. Terrans were exceedingly rare in this region of space, and Dey had only ever met Peter Quinn, so it was a surprise to see another so soon.

"Well, this is an honor. Two terrans in a month," Dey announced as he entered the room, accepting a data pad from the guard. "I am Rhomann Dey, a Nova Corps Denarian at your service. I am here to interview you and figure out how you came to this facility."

"About that," the small terran piped up, "Where and what, exactly, is this facility?" Looking her over from behind the data pad, Rhomann Dey admitted to himself that he was either impressed with this girl for the innocent act or exceedingly disappointed with the Kyln staff for allowing themselves to be intimidated by a clueless girl. She couldn't be much older than twenty or so standard years, could she? And how could she get around space in planet-side garb like hers? It seemed her clothes were made of fibrous materials too thin and delicate to do any physical work in, yet too common to put up appearances. First things first, however.

"You're in the Kyln. A state of the art prison, where transgressors of Nova Corps' laws are sentenced. My turn, now. What is your name, where are you from and how did you get here?"

"I come from Earth, a planet that I think you know as Terra," the girl began, glancing at one of the guards who gave a slight nod of confirmation. "I'm a student, and I have no idea how I came here." She seemed the type to go on, but stopped short for a lack of anything further to offer. In truth, Simmons was truthfully bereft of her catalogue of data she was used to sharing with Coulson and the team, but also terrified of revealing too much. If she were to explain that she had multiple doctorates specializing in the comparative biochemistry of human and alien organisms and she just so happened to have come to a facility with just about every species available in that sector of the galaxy, she could be in for a world of questions she couldn't answer. Dey's expression made it clear, however, that her answer had fallen short of his expectations.

"Right," he said slowly, pushing through data on his pad. He was not convinced. "Let me get this straight. You don't know how you got here; all you know is that out of all the terrans on Terra, a scrawny student is the one to end up a galaxy away from home, is that right? You have nothing more to offer?" The small woman hesitantly nodded.

"I suppose not." To her surprise, Dey spent a moment regarding her before turning on his heel and pushing through the doors he had entered through. She was no Agent May, Simmons knew, but she also knew she had learned a lot from her field experiences in the past year. She had left Fitz to give him the space to heal and grow into his own person, never considering how she would change with Fitz's absence in her own right. Fitz had made it clear recently that she had become afraid and changed for the worse, but Simmons had patched that up later, hadn't she? To be sure, Simmons's time with Hydra and receiving special assignments from Coulson had given Simmons a certain comfort with dealing with potentially volatile people. This Rhomann Dey seemed an honorable enough man, or alien, but she had no idea of his abilities or expertise. For all she knew, he knew she was lying and was calling in a firing squad, or whatever the space equivalent.

For Dey's part, Simmons was right. On the one hand, he couldn't detect any deception on her part. On the other, he didn't buy that Simmons was entirely clueless as to how she'd gotten to the Kyln. The moment he'd strode into the room, the girl had been on edge, but as they spoke she had relaxed into their interactions in a way he couldn't quite articulate. It was as if her initial nerves were a kind of stage fright before she had warmed to the scene she was playing in, and Dey didn't like it. He keyed in a comm connection and used his passcode to access communications outside the Kyln. He saw the faces of another Terran and a furry face sitting in a cockpit on his screen crop up.

"Been a while," Dey greeted the guardians. "Say, if you're in the neighborhood of the Kyln, come swing by and meet one of your long lost compatriots. I'd like to pick your brain."

He was definitely calling in the cavalry of some sort, Simmons realized. She again glanced at the alien clock, although the markings were different, and had more than twelve place markers. How much time, if any, had passed on Earth? Perhaps this was all a bad dream, or she truly had been captured by Hydra while undercover, and she was currently tripping on drugs from going under compliance training. The past year had certainly been rough enough; Simmons wouldn't be adverse to scrapping it and trying again.

No, it hadn't all been bad. Skye had been ambushed into new powers, but she had found family and control and closure. They'd found Mack, Hunter, Bobbi, and yes, they'd sort of been betrayed, but it meant another surviving chapter of Shield had surfaced, lighting the way after Hydra's coup. Coulson had gone fairly mad, yes, but he had done everything within his power to ensure the safety of his team and the safety of civilians. And Fitz. Fitz had gone into that coma. He had come out of the coma. Fitz had been the first person to make Simmons sit back, during those endless nine days, and make her regret goading him into the field. Fitz had become more than just another casualty of Ward's betrayal; he had become a constant reminder to Simmons that it was all her fault, and the following events between them that year were all her failures. But, was that even true? Simmons stole a look at the guard who was posted with her. He'd been with her for a while now, and looked pretty bored at this point. They'd had a rough go of it in the past year, sure, but Simmons would have liked to think some good had come of it all. She'd found her bravery again when the Real Shield had taken the Playground, and Simmons realized where her loyalties lay. She'd also found Fitz's hand that day, which still warmed her. He had taken her hand in his. Simmons snapped her attention back to the clock. Fitz had taken her hand that day, and Simmons was suddenly desperate to have that again.

The groan behind her snapped her attention to the present again. The monolith's liquefication was always preceded by that groaning sound, similar to the echoes of old rattling pipes. The sound was the only predictor of its liquefication Simmons had been able to identify, and only ever afforded as little as a split second and as much as 4.8 seconds. Simmons had spent some amount of time staring at a differently measured clock, waiting to go home, and she suddenly realized her cue. Stealing another glance at the guard, she realized he was too close to the stone, and was within the inundation zone. Taking a breath, Simmons steeled herself, leapt up and tackled him low at the hips. Taken by surprise and behind, the guard gave a shout, but was floored. Simmons was already up and backing away from him by the time the stone's tide was upon her.

Rhomann Dey had finally extricated himself from the tirades of the raccoon subject, had said his farewells to the guardians of the galaxy. They were indeed too far away for a convenient stopover, so Dey bid them farewell and stay out of trouble; a dubious task at best. Pushing through to the back room, he was met with the same guard, the same girl and the same room, but an entirely different scene. One of the artifacts in storage in that room had started to disintegrate and before Dey could shout at them for breaking something, the terran was upon the guard, pushing him away and towards the door. The terran woman had only just stood up and taken a step back when the artifact's materials swallowed her whole and built back up to its original form. The stone's reverberant sound died down and left the room still. Dey and the guard, still on the floor, regarded the monolith, which impassively regarded them back.


	3. Between a Hard Place Notes

I finally found a chunk of time big enough to both binge on episodes I missed and think of next steps for Simmons's Odyssey. I particularly enjoyed Simmons's story about how she and her dad would stargaze while she had spina bifida. I will admit that I have a sizable amount of notes planning out where I had intended on taking the story, but I won't have the time to edit it down to a more fluid narrative. Special shout out to adorestories, who made a request, which I was glad to oblige. My schedule is picking up again, and I've realized I'd rather post the unedited outline for your perusal, instead of leaving a story unfinished and open ended. Please overlook, or enjoy, whatever random comments or bracketed details I've missed or left in. At a later, unforeseen point in time, I may come back and work it down into a more manageable and coherent story.

* * *

Part 2 [Picks up from where Simmons left the Kyln, and is transported to a stolen Kree stone in their cargo hold/]

Yondu Udonta had sent Sudhir to the cargo bay to begin cataloguing the Ravager's latest haul of loot. He received a call over the comm to get down there, and he arrived to find a Terran girl in the hold, having apparently stolen away. She is fearful and won't tell them her name. They also cannot discern how she got aboard, since their holding bay door camera doesn't show her entering. Sudhir comments she must have been as fast as a velok [alien-style velociraptor, in honor of Chris Pratt], and everyone agrees. Yondu decides to put her in one of their holding cells until he can figure out what to do with her, since a rivaling band of mercenaries arrive to loot the area they've just plundered.

Simmons is fascinated with the different species she has been coming across, and is thankful she still has her life. It can't have been longer than a day or two since she was first taken by the monolith. She begins to theorize on the different evolutionary advantages the different specifications give the humanoids she has seen. She wishes she could speak to Fitz, who is likely beside himself with worry for her. [Note: her thinking has fundamentally shifted from a scared victim in need of saving to someone with agency and a mission to return home, although she is still very afraid.]

Fitz was driven by both the faith he would get Simmons back and the fear that this reality was unlikely. The team was at a constant hover in his periphery, and he knew they were staying out of his way for lack of a better plan. With Simmons and her knowledge of alien biology and experience with their artefacts gone, Fitz's speciality with mechanics and Simmons's notes on the monolith were the next best thing they had to offer.

The next day, Simmons is taken from her cell to Yondu. He demands to know who she is and why she stole away on his ship. Simmons jumps into a long-winded explanation of her name and that she is a medical student who has somehow been taken from her planet, Earth. Yondu jokes that lost Terran children keep finding their way aboard his vessel, but isn't sure whether to believe that she is truly lost. The rival crew has caught up to them and are looking to retake the loot. They fire on their ship and overload one of the compression thralls and badly injures one of the crew and injures a couple others. Their medic, a disillusioned man, is passed out from drinking and useless. Simmons offers to help, although she is unfamiliar with their anatomical specifications. Yondu agrees and commands her to earn her keep while the rest of the crew man the ship's guns and defenses. Simmons, with the help of Sudhir for answering questions of anatomy, stabilizes the crew member and tends to the other two. Picking up on the differences between them, she returns to the first patient and closes up the wounds. With Sudhir's help in finding a first aid manual, she reads it and makes an educated guess as to a safe dosage.

Yondu Udonta decides Simmons is a useful asset and "hires" her services to the "Ravager" and informs Simmons her services will be her fare home to Terra. Simmons argues she isn't sure his idea of Terra and her name of Earth are one and the same planet, but he rebuffs this, saying he is certain. Simmons presses on, saying she isn't a stowaway, nor is she an ordinary passenger; she is a lost and confused human who has never been to space before, and if he won't take her to Terra, they should take her to someone who might. Yondu replies that as far as he is concerned, she is a stowaway and she is getting a far better deal than she should ever expect. Now in new assigned quarters, Simmons wonders just how she will get back to Earth, and whether she should have stayed with the Nova Corps Denarian, Rhomann Dey. With nothing else to do, she uses her phone, which she had in her pocket, and takes notes on everything she's seen and learned thus far. With no signal, she sadly puts it in airplane mode and wonders whether she'll be able to configure a phone charger in alien space that will give 5 volts so as not to fry her phone. Wonders whether she'll be able to measure the correct voltage for her phone, in case this section in space uses a drastically different unit.

Fitz is dejected at the end of the second day, having drawn up a whole slew of plans, but not knowing much of the stone's properties or functions. Mack calms him by saying he'd likely have to start from where Simmons left off, but wherever Simmons may be, she's capable of taking care of herself. Fitz isn't convinced, and wishes he could talk to Simmons and get her input, since they work best together. Mack acknowledges that may be true, but from what he's seen and heard of them over the past year, they work pretty well individually, too.

Part 3

Fitz becomes frustrated, because almost a week has gone by and he has a rising sense of urgency that the longer it takes for him to figure out a way to get her back, the less likely it is she ever will get back.

Since medical events don't occur every day for the Ravager, Simmons spends most of her time each day studying the anatomy of different species on the ship from whatever materials they have aboard, taking notes and pictures on her phone, and internally planning her escape to Nova Corps, where she might reach the nice man, Rhomann Dey, who had told her he would try to help her. She finds "junk" parts that she's pretty sure she can turn into a handheld reusable electromagnetic pulser, should she think back to what information Fitz imparted to her over the years. She completes the device and hides it in her belt buckle. Sudhir is equally fascinated with her, since she is the first female Terran she has ever met.

In her first week aboard the Ravager, a deal goes wrong and the client tries to take Simmons hostage to get off the ship. Simmons doesn't want to leave the Ravager, yet, since the Kree monolith is still aboard, so she uses her combat training to disarm him. He kicks the phaser out of her hand and pulls out a second, leaving her in the lurch. He decides she is too much trouble and primes his blaster for a shot. Simmons instinctively clicks her EMP device, though she's unsure whether it works, and the blaster fails to fire. At the same time, other crew member's tech and gear that rely on electronics are rendered useless in that room. Yondu's crew knocks the client out and rounds on Simmons. He is suspicious of her again, since she still hasn't told them her full name beyond Simmons. With the event and what Yondu's crew are calling a spontaneous EMP, Yondu is suspicious that Simmons is a Terran Inhuman, which Simmons denies, saying she has never had any special abilities, and she doesn't know what happened.

Sudhir realizes that the EMP did come from her when they reboot their systems, and relates this to Yondu. Everything about her annoys Yondu, due to the complicated nature surrounding her presence, but he sees a lot of value in her, since she is a gifted scientist and medic, so he lets it go for the time being. Simmons wishes for the umpteenth time that she could confer with Fitz, and bides her time by taking the opportunity to remove the Kree stone from Sudhir's manifest and cart the monolith to the back nook of the holding bay, where she hopes it will be overlooked.

Weeks later, Simmons is losing hope that the stone will take her back, or that Yondu will ever willingly take her home. Simmons realizes that the stone will, every so often, liquify and take whatever objects are within its reach, and she hopes they are arriving on Earth and letting Fitz know it is possible to get back. Yondu's crew starts taking bolder assignments and start using Simmons on certain missions where they anticipate injuries, and Simmons obliges despite. Simmons begins building a name for herself as she completes more jobs for the Ravagers, and part of her even likes the opportunity to break the rules. She finds doing her own thing can even make her feel happy where only following the rules could do that before. She gains the name Saga in honor of her tendency to deliver long winded explanations. Hears of Star Lord, but they keep missing each other's paths.

Yondu realizes Saga's many trips to the holding bay is to visit the monolith that seemingly never gets moved. He realizes it for what it is when he inspects it and immediately dumps it for fear of who could portal in next. Simmons confronts him and tries to convince him not to, but Yondu refuses and tells her she can look back, but only go forward. Simmons realizes this is accurate and plans to escape one way or another.

On a mission soon after, they are wiping a Kree man's criminal record from the central database so that when their system resets, his record will be erased over the entire system. The facility hovers over one of Hala's [planet] oceans, and the team infiltrates it. The mission goes wrong, because their intel was off and they tripped a silent alarm. Without enough time, Simmons forms a plan to separate herself from the Ravager crew and await the Kree authorities. Then, she would work on getting sent back to Earth. Barring that, she hopes to contact Asgard, more likely Nova Corps, although the later options are not ideal. She is eager to reunite with Fitz.

Yondu realizes her plan and gives chase, Sudhir following. Yondu catches her on an outer deck of the hovering fortress and tells her that her plan is stupid, because she doesn't understand that the Kree authorities hate the Nova Corps, Asgard and don't even like Terra, seeing Terrans as weak and inferior. Simmons realizes that may be true, but she would rather find her way without the Ravagers, since she has basically been a comfortable captive for two or more months. With the Kree authorities arriving, Simmons backs off the deck.

Sudhir is stricken that they leave without Saga, since they have grown close, though he realizes his compliance in Saga's captivity. It is only now that she is gone that he realizes he cared her like his dead sister [note: develop this or cut?]. Now that he doesn't know what became of her, he determines to help her if he ever runs into her again.

Simmons falls towards the water. When she hits the water, she dives in and angles her body upward. It takes a minute for her to resurface, since the height of her fall sent her so deep into the water. She treads water and panics when she realizes a large beast is circling her under the water. She kicks out and feels a strange current, but assumes it is her imagination. The beast disappears into the depths and she swims until she finds driftwood from strange tree-like organisms. She is glad that, while she never had more than basic combat training, she had always been a strong swimmer, and her time with Sudhir has given her many more insights into this corner of space. From her raft, she realizes she sees no land.

Since the Kyln, Dey continued to search for her, but feared she was been killed or had befallen further trouble. Visiting his wife and daughter, he commiserates at her desperation to return home.

Fitz becomes neurotic about finding Simmons and devotes himself to running simulations, tests and reviewing the data they have on a daily basis. [Mack moment?]

Simmons spends a couple days adrift at sea. She is too afraid to drink the water, which is much saltier than on Earth, though it doesn't taste inherently lethal. Fitz rigged her phone to be waterproof, but is incompatible with this planet the same as all the others, so she can't keep track of the days. She spends several more of its days adrift at sea, realizing she will likely die, since she has had no food and has drunk only the rainwater from the safety of her raft. She has lost count of the days she has spent adrift since escaping the fortress. [More Odyssey references?]

One day, the sea gets stormy and Simmons's raft is capsized and ripped from her. Simmons swims aimlessly, then spots land and paddles towards it. Reaching land, she stumbles around, finds a hilly area with a ravine and falls asleep in a pile of leaves.

The next morning, Simmons wakes to the sound of laughter. [Odyssey reference, check.]

Part 4

The next morning, Simmons wakes to the sound of laughter.

Simmons wakes up and realizes she was hearing the sound of a gurgling stream. Realizing she hasn't had any water recently and she is close to death anyway, she gives in and drinks the water. She starts to believe the water is bad for her, because she still hears discordant laughter. She realizes the laughter is coming from Kree children who are playing with their new head-cam nearby, and she returns to and hides in her pile of leaves. They find her and when she asks for help, bid her to come to their parent's place.

Vin-Tak, his memories still partially gone, is at his sister's and brother-in-law's farm with their children while he recovers from his memory loss. He spends a lot of time alone and meets his niece and nephew with Simmons, though he doesn't recognize her. He is still a warrior, and patriotic to his planet Hala, and sees her as an intruder. Simmons remembers his name and convinces him she is just as lost as she looks. She knows she can tell him about his lost memories, although she is internally conflicted over how much she should share.

Vin-Tak's niece and nephew, Vel-bak and Ar-bak, are excited to meet a real human, and are fascinated with her physiology. Vin-Tak's sister, Boz-Tak, gives Simmons fluids and treatment to undo the damage of her sunburns, scrapes and bruises. [Too many bak/taks?]

The family plans on how to return Simmons to Earth. Vin-Tak is untrusting of any plans to send her directly to Earth, since, he has a large gap in his memory concerning Earth. He tells the table of recent rumors that the Kree's old weapon, the Inhumans, had recently lost in some battle on earth, and Simmons realizes he is speaking of Skye's family. He tells of how he remembers a feeling that he needed to help protect Earth, but then the next thing he knows, he is on Earth, and without memory of why he came, even with long-belated touches from his hammer/mace. Now, he suspects it had to do with the Inhumans, but he cannot be sure.

Simmons formally introduces herself and gives an explanation of what happened to him. When she mentions the terragen crystals and how they were lost at sea, tying it to his tale, Vin-Tak's memory clicks and he remembers everything. He is grateful to her for filling in the blanks and promises to help her return to Earth. Simmons is relieved, although she fears how he would react if he ever stopped to think of whether Shield had ever thought of returning his memory to him.

Vin-Tak obligingly contacts Rhomann Dey, who sends Star-Lord and his crew to ferry her to Xandar, since other Kree would likely try to prevent Simmons from returning home.

Star-Lord's crew sees how emaciated Simmons still appears after three weeks lost at sea, and let her have free reign over the mess area. Simmons takes more pictures of the foods. The crew promise to get her to Xandar as quickly as possible. Peter Quill (Star-Lord) asks many questions on pop culture, and Simmons is fascinated to learn he is Terran, though he avoids discussing details. She doesn't have much music from the 70s, 80s or early 90s, but has some classics that she lets Peter Quill listen to.

Rhomann Dey is relieved to see Simmons alive, and takes her home with him, where his wife and daughter feed her and let her sleep. [Check: can she hold solids, yet?] The next day, they head to the Kyln, where the stone has stayed in the property room, cordoned off.

Sudhir had been arrested by Nova Corps some time after Hala, and is in the Kyln to hear that Nova Corps was gearing up to use a Kree artifact in the Kyln property room. He figures Simmons must have gotten to them. He wants to say goodbye, since he never had that chance with this sister before she died, [keep?] and if she leaves the Nova Corps territories, he will likely never see her again.

Some of Nova Corps' scientists stabilized the Kree stone to ensure she be sent to the right place [Note: figure out science bs to explain this - oscillations - alters which stone is picked?], but they warn her that since she is not Kree, she will bond with the material instead of passing through, and would have to wait for someone at that end to free her. Dey asks her if she is willing to take the risk, since it has been a while since she disappeared, and they may not be performing the search anymore on Terra. Simmons thinks of Fitz and says yes.

Sudhir sneaks into the property area easily enough, but he was recognizable as part of the Ravagers crew and his notoriety came back to bite him. Several rival inmates assume he is trying to escape, and they simultaneously want to come and want to prevent one of Yondu's favorite crew members from leaving. Things escalate as Sudhir tries to reach the property room to wait for Simmons and say good bye. A full out riot starts and order spirals out of control.

Fitz in disbelief. Coulson was explaining to Fitz that he needed to prepare for 'the worst.' The rest of the team had started to accept that Simmons might not come back, but Fitz was becoming obsessive. After that day's tests, Coulson was going to have some appointments for Fitz scheduled with Dr. Garner. They would not stop looking for Simmons, but the reality was that they still aren't sure what the monolith does or if Simmons was even alive.

Simmons thanks Rhomann as they head to the property room. The rioting sets off alarms and they need to race to the stone, since time is still of the essence. The guards with them disperse to deal with the riot while Simmons and Rhomann continue to the property room. The riot begins to escalate. Sudhir finds them and tells them he'll help them get to the property room, but Dey tells Simmons she may have to defer until after it settles. Sudhir says that may not be possible, since rioters tend to try for the most amount of damage possible, and the property room is a given target. If something happened to the stone, Simmons would have to go through wild space {Check: does Marvel have stuff on 'wild space' already?] to get to Earth, which is arguably more dangerous, and a lot longer.

Dey is marginally certain Sudhir is a genuine ally, so he opts to lead some of the approaching inmates away to give them more time. Sudhir and Simmons, after a few close calls, make it to the property room and barricade it from the inside. One of the Nova Corps scientists explains that the external power has been cut off, and the stabilizing reactors are running off of the generator. When some of the Ravagers's rival inmates come close to breaking the door's bolt by sparking its initiating mechanism, Sudhir suggests using an electromagnetic pulse. [Distracting details?] The Nova Corps employee negates this and says that would knock out the stabilization reactors, and defeat Simmons's goal. The Nova Corps operator, Hoshnuq, works on activating the stone while Simmons and Sudhir hold off rival inmates. It takes longer for the generators to charge without the facility's usual capacity, but it steadily grows closer. Sudhir takes the time to inform Simmons that he never got a chance to tell his sister he loved her before she died. He tells her she's the sister he wishes he still had, and just wanted to say goodbye. He tells her that if his sister had lived, he imagines she might be like the bandit Saga, whom Simmons has become. [Quirky, over-dramatic complement. Stylize the compliment towards Guardians of Galaxy feeling rather than Shield feeling. Diamonds in the rough speech for graduation - awkward.]

The inmates break in before the stone is ready. Simmons and Sudhir use weapons found in the property room lockers to hold the line. Things devolve and Sudhir takes a blaster shot, tells her to go. Simmons has to hold the line without Sudhir and Hoshnuq informs her the Kree stone's stabilizers have steadied in power. Hoshnuq is killed by a blaster rifle, and Simmons sprints to the stone before turning back, she sees Sudhir looking at her, nodding for her to go, with inmates approaching from beyond him. [Throw back to Yondu's comment about looking back - going forward.] Among a hail of fire from varied improvised weapons and weapons taken from nearby lockers, Simmons impulsively decides to stay to defend Sudhir and shouts that she's coming, but is grabbed by the Kree stone as it reacts and liquefies. Her last view of the Kyln property room is of Sudhir disappearing behind the chasing inmates trying to catch her.

Simmons next sees the familiar room where the Kree stone was being kept on Earth. She barely registers that she was sent to the right place when she feels herself unbonding with the stone as it liquefies and she is dumped onto the floor.

The team freezes at first. After every day of the stone reacting, or maybe reacting, but invariably without delivering Simmons, they aren't sure it truly happened. Simmons is equally shocked to finally see them again. Simmons's voice is hoarse from her time lost at sea, and raw from yelling in the Kyln, but greets them.

Fitz had known the team had been worried about his well-being, since he hadn't been eating or sleeping regularly, but the the sight of Simmons made him feel like he was in the prime of his life [He should, he's in his 20s]. Her voice was near-gone, her hair wild and unkempt and she had fresh scrapes and bruises from some recent event. Sunburns as anyone from the British isles would have. [Note: skeletal/feral?]. Tangibly there. Hug?

Back in the Kyln, Rhomann Dey helps Sudhir up and they wonder if Simmons made it to Terra, or if she's wherever Yondu dumped the other Kree portal, or in with yet another portal.


End file.
